ingdom Under Fire: Heroes, an Xbox-only game, is set during a mythical time when Christian defenders are battling the forces of the Dark Legion, a group of half-vampires. With infantry battalions, as well as heavily armed melee forces such as Orcs, each side strives to dominate the continent of Bersia.
The human characters you can control include Rupert (a two-handed-weapon warrior), Ellen (a leader and archer) and Walter (captain of the Ecclesian Emissaries). The most captivating of the Dark Legion's forces is Leinhart, a Goth hero skilled with a one-handed sword. After choosing a character and a minimal tutorial, you're plunged into gameplay.
The game is made of three basic parts: all-out one-on-one fights, real-time strategy sections and waypoint sessions at the base or castle (where players can buy powerups for better skills and armor). During the strategy portion of the game, players use an inset map to explore the terrain, ordering units of infantry, knights, archers and spearmen to defeat incoming enemies.
New with Heroes is the ability for Kingdom Under Fire fans to play multiplayer matchups over Xbox Live. Playing online—with three to six players—provides both PvP action and cooperative, "friendly" play, which allows you to build experience points together.
Heroes? To whom?
It's not exactly a new phenomenon when a fantasy game with elves and warriors takes a predictable plot turn here or there. But Heroes takes the cliched cake. "A single detail, overlooked by Vellond, not only foiled the plans of that nation, but plunged the entire continent of Bersia into turmoil. And so began the Enchilada War." What?
OK—that enchilada part was just a mishearing of what the script says, but it might as well have been real, considering the high-fantasy gobbledygook that riddles this game. Add on top of that little details like the ill-considered and offensive nickname that the game gives to
Dark Elves ("Darkies") and you've got a game that skipped not only the grammar check, but the reality check, too.
But even if we give the game designers latitude for poor scriptwriting or translation—especially on that last bit—how do they score on other fronts? How are the game mechanics?
In a word: confusing. By having to toggle between moving and arranging your legions and the Dynasty Warrior-esque hack-and-slash battling, this game has too many elements in play at any one time. While PC games can easily contain this much complexity, Heroes simply doesn't work with the Xbox's controllers in the way that it should.
On top of the stymied storytelling and unsuccessful game design, pile on circa-2000 graphics and you have a title that could be good for a rental, but not much else. Fans of the series—who will probably see this title through rose-colored glasses, based on enjoyment of the prior Kingdom Under Fire game—can enjoy the online support for up to six players. But Heroes has little to recommend itself to new players unfamiliar with its premise.
You have to admire Ellen's dedication to battle. She didn't notice that she left the castle without her pants.
—Jennifer
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